Richmond dispatch. [volume] (Richmond, Va.) 1884-1903, 1887-04-23
The Other Side.
10 the Editor Of the Dispatch:

To The razor ~ me DiSpnfcH
The author of the communication
"Other Considerations, which APP
peared in your paper of April Doth,
may be a "distinguished Virginian, )"
but / fency he viii hardly attain dis
tinction in the application of statistics
to social science.
Yourself, Mr.. Editor, are recognized
as champion Gll-round " master of
such matters. and you know that no in
telligent student of statistics regards
such tables as are given in the census
rs Of much value in ascertaining the
measure of States wealth, or as data
from which TO compute the increase or
decrease of the mass of individual
wealth. Apart from the admitted gross
inaccuracies of the census Of 1870, cen
sus computations Of wealth are not ac-
cepted as trustworthy or useful for rea-
sons familiar to every student and UNI
necessary to detail here.
But, granting the census figures used
bv the writer of Other COnsidera-
tons" are practically correct, do they
establish an Actual loss in values from
1870 to 1880? | think not. Interpret
ed by legitimate statistical methods, |
think these very figures, with all their
faults, demonstrate an increase in the
values considered.
Other Considerations " gives the
taxable values Of property, real and
personal, in Virginia in 1870 at $780,
439, 917.
Now, 10y Crosvenor's Table the pur-
chasing power Of &2G5, 49,, 917 Of law
Tul money in 1870 was S274,079, 937.
"Other Considerations gives the
taxable values OF property, real and
personal, in Virginia iii 1850 at $685.
155, 135.
BY Grosvenor's Table the purchasing
power of sos, 455, 1875 OF lawful money
in 1880 was S3l7,7lS,7oS.
The apparent loss as given 10y "Other
Conscientious was $50, 9St, 1872, while
the absolute gain IN the appreciation of
lawful money shows an actual increase
of 143, S,Sol>
And, rs your distinguished CORE
spondent's argument was based on
decentralization Of statistics Of doubt
ful value, J apprehend that his deduc-
tions are hardly entitled to acceptance
or approval.
To Illustrate again his error: If in
seventeen years the "selling price Of
land in the country has gone down fully
one half" as is asserted in "other con-
siderat!ons," has not the purchasing
power Of one dollar Of lawful money
gone up from 10 to 1.26 in the same
length of time ? Is it not at once APP
parent that it is not land values which
have shrunk so enormously, but the
purchasing power of money which has
SO wonderfully increased?
Perhaps your distinguished CORE
spondent's conviction of the part played
by railways in causing a decline IN ag-
ricultural wealth on the Atlantic sea-
board has been attained also by using
unreliable statistics and interpreting
them by faulty methods of reasoning.
don't think any statistics, or any
misuse of them, would persuade Vir-
einians 70 believe our State had been
shrinking in wealth for seventeen years
at the rate of nearly B per cent. an
nually, or that for a long time to come
We are to expect like shrinkage. Such
I understand to he the main point in
the communication Of "Other Conside-
rations," and l do not think such pessi-
mlsm should go unchallenged and I'M
contradicted. IL. IL. +.